Three Days of Darkness: Understanding Asara B’Teves

As Klal Yisroel observes the fast of Asara B’Teves on Tuesday, we commemorate not just the beginning of Yerushalayim’s destruction, but a profound spiritual crisis that unfolded across three consecutive days. While most widely known as the day the Babylonian king Nevuchadnetzar laid siege to Yerushalayim, the period from the 8th through the 10th of Teves represents what Chazal describe as three days when “darkness descended upon the world.”

The fast itself commemorates the event described in Sefer Melachim 2, Yechezkel and Yirmiyahu, when Nevuchadnetzar surrounded Yerushalayim with siege walls, not allowing anything in or out. This was the beginning of the destruction of the First Beis Hamikdash, which would happen three and a half years later.

Hundreds of years later, on the 8th of Teves, something happened that Chazal describe as deep darkness. King Ptolemy II of Egypt forced seventy-two Chachamim to translate the Torah into Greek; what would become known as the Targum Shivim, or Septuagint.

Maseches Sofrim records that this day “was as calamitous for Yisroel as the day the Egel Hazahav was made, since the Torah could not be accurately translated.” The darkness represented the confinement of the infinite wisdom of Hashem into the limitations of a foreign language, allowing the nations to access and misinterpret the Torah without the requisite mesorah.

Yet even in this darkness, Hashem’s hand was visible. The Gemara in Maseches Megillah relates an extraordinary miracle. Ptolemy gathered that chachamim and placed each one in a separate room without telling them his intentions. He then commanded each sage: “Write for me the Torah of Moshe, your teacher.”

Hakadosh Baruch Hu placed wisdom in the heart of every single chacham, and miraculously, they all independently made the exact same changes to protect the Torah’s honor and ensure Jewish safety.

The most famous example involved the arneves; the hare or rabbit listed as a non-kosher animal. The problem? Ptolemy’s wife was named Arneves. The sages feared that if they wrote “arneves” among the impure animals, the king would accuse them of mocking his family. So every single sage, working independently, changed it to “tze’iras haraglayim”—”the one with short legs.”

Other miraculous changes included reordering the first verse from “Bereishis bara Elokim” to “Elokim bara bereishis,” preventing the king from thinking a power called “Bereishis” created Hashem. They also changed “Let us make man” to the singular “I shall make man” to eliminate any suggestion of multiple gods.

Despite this miracle, the day remained one of mourning. Our treasured Torah, intended to be an exclusive relationship between us and Hashem, was now going to be abused and twisted into other religions’ falsities.

Between the translation and the siege lies the enigmatic 9th of Teves. The Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 580:2) lists it as a day of tragedy but adds an unusual phrase: “Lo nodah eizeh tzarah eira bo”—”It is not known what tragedy occurred on it.”

However, the Selichos recited on Asara B’Teves reveal the answer. The Kol Bo cites these Selichos, which state that Ezra HaSofer was niftar on this day. Ezra was compared to Moshe Rabbeinu himself. He restored the Torah to Klal Yisroel, brought the Jews back to Eretz Yisrael and created the infrastructure that would sustain authentic Yiddishkeit through millennia of exile.

His passing marked the end of the era of nevuah, as Chazal say that Ezra and Malachi are same person.

The Bnei Yissaschar zy”a provides a profound insight for understanding these three days. He explains that they represent an attack on the Shelosha Kasarim; the Three Crowns –  Torah, Kehunah, and Malchus.

The 8th struck at Keser Torah. By forcing the translation of the Torah into Greek, its exclusivity and purity were compromised. The infinite Divine wisdom was reduced to human language, stripped of its layers of meaning that can only be accessed through the mesorah.

The 9th struck at Keser Kehunah. Ezra wasn’t just a leader; he was a scion of the great kohanim who embodied the crown of Avodah. His death severed the prophetic chain and marked the end of direct communication with Heaven.

The 10th struck at Keser Malchus. The siege of Yerushalayim physically suffocated the capital of the Jewish Kingdom, attacking the kingship of Beis Dovid.

Asara B’Teves has a unique distinction: it’s the only minor fast day that can fall on a Friday, and when it does, we still fast until nightfall despite the interference with Shabbos preparations. This stringency reflects the day’s importance. The Avudraham even suggests that if the 10th of Teves could fall on Shabbos (which is impossible), it would override Shabbos; a chumra shared only with Yom Kippur. This is because the phrase “etzem hayom hazeh“—”this very day” is used to describe Asarah b’teves in Yechezkel (24:2).

How could one fast on Shabbos, when even Tisha Ba’av, the day the Beis Hamikdash was actually destroyed, is pushed off due to it?

Rav Yonason Eibeschutz and the Bnei Yissaschar invoke the principle of Aschalta D’Paranusah; the beginning of a tragedy is more severe than its conclusion.
Much like Tisha B’Av is observed on the 9th (when the fire started) rather than the 10th (when the Temple mostly burned), Asara B’Teves is viewed with extreme gravity because it was the root of the destruction. The siege was the “beginning of the end” that led to the churban and galus. The Midrash Tanchuma even notes that the Beis Hamikdash was fitting to be destroyed on the 10th of Teves, but Hashem, in His mercy, delayed the physical destruction until the summer so the Jews would not be exiled into the freezing cold.

The Chasam Sofer expands this concept. He explains that we do not fast merely for a siege that occurred 2,500 years ago. Rather, based on the dictum that “any generation in which the Beis Hamikdash is not rebuilt is as if it was destroyed in its days,” Asara B’Teves is the day the Beis Din shel Maaleh convenes annually to decide if the Beis Hamikdash will be destroyed again this year.

As we fast today, we’re not just mourning ancient events. We’re acknowledging that the churban continues until the Beis Hamikdash is rebuilt. But we’re also recognizing that the same miracles that protected the Torah then continue to sustain us now. The three crowns may have been attacked, but they were never destroyed. They wait, along with us, for the day when darkness will finally give way to light.

May this Asara B’Teves be the last one we observe as a fast, and may we soon merit to see these days transformed into Yamim Tovim with the coming of Moshiach, b’mhera v’yameinu.